EPrints on Cultural Heritage

Principles of preservation: An introduction to the International Charters for Conservation and Restoration 40 years after the Venice Charter

Petzet, Michael
(2004)
Principles of preservation: An introduction to the International Charters for Conservation and Restoration 40 years after the Venice Charter.
In:
International Charters for Conservation and Restoration.
Monuments & Sites, I
.
ICOMOS, München, pp. 7-29.
ISBN 3-87490-676-0
[Book Section]

Abstract (in English)

The Venice Charter, the International Charter for the Conservation
and Restoration of Monuments and Sites (1964), phrased 40
years ago by the 2nd International Congress of Architects and
Technicians of Historic Monuments, was also the foundation
stone of ICOMOS since the resolution to found an International
Council of Monuments and Sites was adopted in Venice at the
same time as the Charter: the fundamental “resolution concerning
the creation of an international non-governmental organization
for monuments and sites”, whose General Constituent Assemble
was held a year later in Cracow. In his preface to the
publication of the congress papers Piero Gazzola, first President
of ICOMOS, later rightly underlined this close connection: The
results of the meeting are momentous. We need only recall the
creation of the International Council of Monuments and Sites –
ICOMOS – the institution which constitutes the court of highest
appeal in the area of the restoration of monuments, and of the
conservation of ancient historical centers, of the landscape and
in general of places of artistic and historical importance. That
organization must supervise the creation of specialized personnel,
its recruitment and advancement. It must oversee the use of
international exchanges and in addition concern itself with the
creation of local international committees that are capable of
counseling international organizations (UNESCO, the Council
of Europe, etc.). ... With the creation of ICOMOS a gap lamented
by every nation has been closed and a need which had been
felt by every local organization concerned with conservation
satisfied. But above all, it is to be recognized that the most important
positive result by far of this assembly has been the formulation
of the international code for restoration: not simply a
cultural episode but a text of historical importance. In fact, it
constitutes an obligation which no one will be able to ignore, the
spirit of which all experts will have to keep if they do not want
to be considered cultural outlaws. The concerns thus codified
constitute for everyone today an unassailable document the validity
of which will be affirmed more and more as time passes,
thereby uniting the name of Venice forever with this historic
event. In fact, from now on, the Charter of Venice will be in all
the world the official code in the field of the conservation of cultural
properties.
With his words about the Venice Charter, the foundation document
of ICOMOS, Piero Gazzola, who demanded high standards
of the work of ICOMOS, standards of which we should
stay aware in the future, was right. This Charter, to which in later
years other Charters and Principles adopted by the General
Assemblies of ICOMOS have referred, is admittedly in some respects
a historical document typical of the time of its creation
(cf. p. 28) and needs to be newly interpreted time and again.
However, it is and remains an irreplaceable instrument for our
work on the international level, and attempts to write a “new
Charter of Venice” – one example being the Cracow Charter of
2000 – make little sense.